Blue Ridge Technology

​Over the last couple of years AI has been popping up everywhere, including in Windows 11. What’s interesting is the response from everyday people both at work and at home. First people were skeptical or unsure about AI. Then they were amazed by it. Then they started tinkering with how it could help them at work. And then they ran into its limitations. Somewhere along the way, sentiment started to change a bit. People got annoyed with AI — and with how every single big tech company seemed to be cramming AI-powered everything into just about every software and platform. Don’t get us wrong: AI delivers genuine value in business, and it’s a good idea to look for where exactly it can improve specific areas of your workflows. AI-powered meeting summaries are incredible, for example: they give you capabilities most businesses were never going to pay to do manually. The best ones even surface insights you might have missed. What’s New in Windows 11 Let’s get back to Windows: if you’ve felt l...

Ask most business owners and leaders, and you’ll hear that they’re committed to (or at least concerned about) data security. But what does that mean exactly, especially in 2026? Most everyday businesses have data in the cloud, stored locally on network servers, copied onto individual machines, you name it. And that says nothing about AI and how it can affect data security. If you’re worried about data security for your business — or even if you’re pretty sure everything’s OK — It’s time for a quick reality check. Troubling Stats from Large Businesses If you’re reading this blog post, chances are you don’t represent an enterprise business. But since the big guys tend to be more focused on IT security, the state of data security there does have something to say about small and midsized businesses. And even among large businesses, the reports aren’t great. In surveys of IT leaders, data security consistently ranks near or atop the list of concerns or priorities around IT moderniz...

Teams Update ​If you’re like lots of other business leaders, you conduct a fair amount of business over video call. Whether it’s an internal all-hands, a marketing webinar, or a 1:1 sales call, all of us spend time in apps like Microsoft Teams and Zoom. If you’re a frequent Teams user, then chances are you’ve run into a frustrating (and sometimes embarrassing) problem more than once: accidentally ditching your meeting. You’re not alone there because, if you ask us, Microsoft put one pretty massive design flaw into the app’s user interface: the placement of the “Leave call” button. Now that’s changing — finally. The Problem: Questionable Menu Button Layout When you’re in a Teams meeting, you have access to a number of functions at the bottom of the app window. (This is true on mobile and on desktop, but we’re focusing on the desktop experience here.) Right in the middle is an unlabeled icon of a phone. Click it, and bam — you’re no longer in a Teams meeting. There’s nothing inherently w...

​Microsoft says Windows 11’s top productivity app is…Copilot? We’re a little skeptical. If you think about your workday, what’s the single most important app you use? The one it feels like you just couldn’t make it through the day without? Microsoft’s newest marketing says the answer is Microsoft Copilot, the AI assistant built into the Microsoft ecosystem (and yes, available as a standalone app). We’re not so sure. More important than Outlook? Teams? To Do? What about File Explorer, OneDrive, or even Snipping Tool? Not to mention, if you use any industry-specific software or big SaaS products (like Salesforce, Shopify, or Adobe products), those probably jump up pretty high on your list. So, respectfully: What is Microsoft talking about here? We have a pretty good idea. Let’s start with the good. The Good: Copilot Can Be Incredibly Useful It’s hard not to notice that AI is literally everywhere in business marketing. Which is probably what this Microsoft claim is: more marketing than re...

AI Passwords ​Depending on what you do, AI can do a lot for your individual productivity. Given how effective some AI tools like ChatGPT and Gemini are at certain business tasks, like drafting emails, improving grammar, synthesizing information, or even writing or correcting code. But recent research shows us one thing you shouldn’t use AI for: creating passwords. A clearer understanding of how these systems work can show you why. Here’s what you need to know. Why People Use AI for Password Creation We’ve warned for more than a decade that using simple passwords is dangerous, and reusing them is even worse. Passwords that use your birthday, common patterns like 2468, or even the word “password” itself (yes, this really still happens) are easy to guess. When you reuse those easy passwords across multiple accounts, all it takes is one right guess and the bad guys could gain access to all sorts of information. People hear that passwords need to be long, complex, and unique, but we humans ...